


Sometimes being an idiot is the smartest thing to do

by Idun_Winter



Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Developing Relationship, F/M, Humour, Modern AU, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-06
Updated: 2015-05-06
Packaged: 2018-03-29 07:38:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3887809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Idun_Winter/pseuds/Idun_Winter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Well, let's just say: Totally AU, set in modern-day England, featuring a not that asshole-y Loki and a pretty badass girl called Freya. Rated M for smut in later chapters. I apologise for everything.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

"I still can't believe it, Freya. You're going on a date with him!", Anne exclaimed while literally bouncing with excitement.  
"Anne, how often do I have to tell you: It's NOT a date!", Freya answered, already having given the exact same answer to the exact same exclamation many, many times.

"Of course it is!", the red-haired curvy girl replied with a huge smile on her face.  
"And what, my dear, what in the world does make you believe that my...meeting, my meeting with Loki Odinsson is in any humanly possible way a date?"  
Anne smiled. "For once, Frey, you're wearing your date outfit."  
Freya snorted-not very ladylike, but she didn't care. "I do not have such a thing as a 'date outfit'. This merely is a green dress that happens to be my favourite dress, and I'm wearing it today because I felt like it. Not because this is a date." "You never wear this dress, except when going on dates. What means you wore it exactly twice in the two years I know you. This is by far less often than you would wear a 'favourite dress'.", replied Anne triumphantly.  
Freya sighed. "This dress just happens to be a little bit to fancy to wear every day. That's why I'm not wearing it more often. NOT because this is a date."  
"Girl, all your clothes are too fancy for college."  
"That's not true!" Anne laughed.  
"Of course it is! You don't own a single hoodie, for Christ's sake! And even if I believed you, what I don't, the two of you are going to a pub. This dress is definitely too fancy for a pub. The only reason you wear this dress is because you know it shows off these abnormally long and perfect legs of yours, makes your eyes even more blue than they already are and shows that you definitely don't have a single bit of excess fat on your body, to put it short, because it shows that you look better than any person has the right to do." Freya sighed.  
"Okay, you little monster, even if we just for one second accepted your illogical nonsense as valid, what else, except the dress, makes you believe that this is a date?"  
Another triumphant smile from Anne. "You are just now applying makeup."  
"That's not an argument.", Freya retorted while dabbing some dark green eyeshadow on her eyelid,"Lot's of people apply makeup every single day, you, for example."  
"But you, Freya Winter, only apply it on two very distinct occasions: Firstly, when you have one of those awkward family dinners with your relatives, and secondly, when you go on a date. But when you apply makeup for a family dinner, it's battle paint. Then you do these intense smokey eyes and put on this dark red lipstick and look like you are a badass Valkyrie out on revenge, but somehow still manage to pull it off."  
"Yeah, it's because I won't give this sick family of mine the satisfaction of seeing me in another state than, as you just so eloquently put it, looking like a 'badass Valkyrie out on revenge'. You are, for once, right. For family dinners, my makeup is my battle paint. But what makes you guess that this makeup"-she pointed to her face-"isn't applied for the same purpose as my family-dinner-makeup, so to speak: not giving Loki Odinsson, aka the biggest asshole on planet earth, the satisfaction of seeing me in another state than 'badass Valkyrie'?"  
"Because"-Anne made a dramatic pause-"this isn't battle makeup."  
Freya guffawed. "What brings you to this conclusion, my dear Anne?"  
"Quite simple, my dear Freya. For once, there is no blood-red lipstick on your lips. Also, no black smokey eyes, no hyper-dramatic black eyeliner that's drawn so long it almost touches your hairline, and you don't have false lashes on. Instead, only some...well, I'm not going to call this 'subtle', but you wouldn't look good in subtle makeup, for you, it's nothing or a lot of it. It's however is less product and it's not as dark as your battle paint. Your lipstick isn't that dark, the eyeshadow is dark green, not black, heck, you even blended it a little, the eyeliner isn't even that dramatic and you only have mascara on, no false lashes. That's not battle paint, that's your version of looking cute."  
Freya's head snapped up and she glared at Anne. "I am not, never was, and will never be 'cute'."  
Anne ignored the angry glare and said: "You aren't. You're badass. Another way in which you are very much like him, y'know? And for Christ's sake, leave your hair down. You are blessed with hip-long, chestnut-brown hair that looks like you jumped out of a Disney movie, and I'm probably the only person that has ever seen it down, and that's only because we live together."  
"I'm not like him!", Freya exclaimed whilst inserting the two chopsticks that she always used to hold her hair up in a bun into said hair.  
"You two are the only two people in this university, probably in the whole goddamn world, who can legitimately say that they have hit a professor. That's so extraordinary, that must mean something.", Anne pointed out.  
"Miller deserved it! He tried to grope this girl!"  
"I'm not saying he didn't deserve it, I'm just saying that breaking his nose is the single coolest and most badass thing anyone could do."  
Freya sighed-again. "I didn't even know he was a prof, he was just a guy in this bar. Though, even if I knew it, I still would have hit him. A little harder, probably. I still can't believe that this girl decided not to go to the police."  
After a little pause, she finally gave up and asked the question Anne was probably dying to answer right now." Fine, whom did he hit?", she asked whilst applying mascara.  
"Miller!"  
"You are joking. There is no way we hit the same professor."  
"I'm not! It actually was because of the same thing-well, a different girl and a different bar, but he groped her and Loki hit him. He didn't break his nose, though, so you won this competition on 'who is more badass'."  
"Fuck.", was Freya's only reply, before adding: "Well, any other reasons why this meeting is a date in your eyes?"  
Another triumphant smile from Anne. "Yes." Silence followed her statement, until Freya couldn't take it anymore.  
"Would her majesty, Queen Anne, care to enlighten me, the worthless peasant Freya Winter?", she asked ironically after a few seconds.  
"She would. This reason just is so damn great I needed a moment to savour my victory in my head."  
"Okay, girl, out with it."  
Anne practically beamed with that smile of hers. "It's the cause of this 'meeting', as you call it! You claim you are 'tutoring' each other-" "Yes, because he asked me! He asked me to explain Business Ethics to him and offered to help me with Statistics instead! And I was too polite to refuse because I was taken by surprise, idiot I am!", Freya fell in.  
"Silence, Frey. However, both of you are capable and smart enough to deal with these classes yourself. It might take some work or a little effort, but neither he or you would have serious problems with them. You might not ace them, but a good B would be no problem for any of you, without a single bit of tutoring, because both of you are smarter than anyone has the right to be. The reason he asked you to explain Ethics to him is because he wanted to see you, not because he actually needs help in this class, and the reason you accepted is because you wanted to see him, not because you need help in statistics."  
"That's nonsense." Freya frowned at Anne, grabbed her bag, and left the girl without a word. She crossed the living room towards the door, and whilst half being outside, called over her shoulder: "It is not a date!", to which Anne replied: "Of course it is!", just before Freya slammed the door shut. 

Damn her. Damn her, damn her psychology major and especially damn the fact that deep down, Freya knew that she was right. At least a little bit right. Damn that as well.


	2. The not-a-date date

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Whatever you want to call this evening, it went well.

She arrived at the pub fifteen minutes before they were supposed to meet. That was planned-she wanted to check the terrain. Who knows where Loki decided to let this tutoring happen, after all? Could be this was some sort of strip club or whatever, chosen specifically to make the whole situation worse than it already was. 

_I shouldn't have said yes. Gods, why did I say yes. Idiot._   
Still, at least from the outside, the whole thing seemed fine. A nice place, even. Old, wooden tables, armchairs instead of chairs, and not a single piece of furniture matched. She almost didn't want to admit it, but this was exactly the sort of place she liked-even though her dress would totally be out of place here.   
She couldn't bring herself to care, though, in Freya's opinion, being overdressed wasn't much of a problem, whilst being underdressed certainly was.  
So, after five minutes of thorough observation trough a window, she decided not to bear the icy December cold any longer and enter the pub.   
_Let the fun begin_ , she thought grimly whilst pushing the heavy, wooden door open. Inside, it was warm and smelled of wood and good beer an a little smoke. Wonderful.   
She found a table in a rather quiet corner, right next to a window, chose the seat with the back to the wall-she always picked a seat from which she could see as much a possible of the room she was in, just an odd quirk of hers- sat down and waited. _It will work out, girl. You just explain this text to him and let him explain this weird chart to you. He might be an asshole, but he does understand statistics, so it will only do your dignity harm._ The problem with this was however that for Freya Winter, her dignity was the single most important thing in the world.   
_I'll just turn the table, then. He asked me for this meeting, let him suffer. Words are, after all, still my best weapon._  
She didn't need to wait long before the door opened and gave way to her tutoring partner. _I'm not the only one who's overdressed._  
He certainly looked at least as out of place in here as she did in his black cloth trousers, black suit jacket and green collared shirt. _  
Fuck. Green._  
The exact same dark forest green as her dress. For some odd reason, this bugged her extremely.   
He searched the room for her with his eyes-also green, damn it- and found her. With a smirk on his face, he walked over and sat down, now smirking directly at her. She already wanted to hit him, and he hadn't even spoken a word.   
_Fine, girl. Remember, you know your manners. Just be icy polite, get over with this, and in about two hours, you're free. You'll survive two hours, won't you?_ , she told herself and stretched out her hand to him, saying "Good evening, Loki. Let's start, shall we?" with a polite voice and a polite smile.   
He just raised an eyebrow, shook her hand and replied: "Good evening, Freya. Nice dress, it looks good on you. Let's start with Business Ethics, fine?" _  
Fuck, he noticed the dress._  
"Fine.", she replied and put the text on the table whilst he took his paper out of a notebook.   
"So, what exactly didn't you get?", she asked.   
He chuckled. It sounded arrogant, and part of her wanted to hit him, break his nose like she broke Prof Miller's one, but some other part of her also liked the sound. For that, she wanted to hit him too, no, more like kick him, but not on the face, but some other place where it also hurts a lot.   
Then, he actually replied. "I don't get why in the world this idiot claims that egoism isn't good for a businessman."   
She couldn't help but blurt out: "or a businesswoman."   
Another odd quirk of hers: She absolutely hated it when people exclusively used the male forms of jobs. There were gender-neutral alternatives for so many of them, like 'businessperson', in this case.   
He raised an eyebrow and ironically stated: "Cheers to the emancipation."  
"You better thank that emancipation, because without it, I highly doubt that it would ever have become accepted for a man to wear something as 'feminine' as this luscious hair of yours." _Ha! Take that!_  
Now raising the other eyebrow, he asked: "Jealous?"   
Without another word, she reached behind her head for the chopsticks holding her hair into a bun near her neck, pulled them out, shook her head a little and let the chestnut waves fall down around her shoulders, down to her hips. With a triumphant feeling, she noticed his eyes widened a little. "Don't worry, I don't think I have any reason to be jealous of your hair, but thanks for your concern."  
 _So, this round I won._  
"But also don't worry about not understanding his claim, you're not alone with that. We know since Adam Smith that egoism is great for business and actually helps all of us."   
Now, he raised another eyebrow, but this time in genuine surprise. "If you agree with me on that, how come you seem to have not the least bit of a problem with this..."- he gave the text a disgusted glance-"with this stuff?"   
Before she could reply, the waitress arrived at their table. They both ordered beer. "Because I'm capable of adjusting my opinions, depending on the opinions of the professor.", she finally answered after the woman had left.  
He grinned. "Wicked. And I though you were a person full of morals."  
"I study business. How on earth could anyone believe me to have morals?"  
Loki laughed at that. She definitely liked his laugh. "I am sorry, will you forgive me my grievous error?"   
"I may, if you behave well. Now, get out a pen, we will somehow get you to understand how this idiot defends his absurd thesis, and then you are going to write that bullshit down in your next essay and you're going to collect the excellent grade you'll undoubtedly receive for it."   
He looked at her for a few seconds before saying: "This definitely took an interesting turn.", to which she answered:   
"This guy's argumentation won't, trust me. I may be full of surprises, but whoever claims that egoism is a bad thing whilst calling himself a classical liberal only surprises with interesting drugs stored in his or her bedside stand, not with interesting arguments. I first thought some awful error happened during the printing and he actually meant to say 'socialist', then it would all make sense. Or "neoliberal", but the two are not that far away anyways."   
Another laugh.   
_Humour and a little sarcasm. That's a game I understand. If this is going on like it's going right now, we may even both survive this evening without scratching each other's eyes out._  
Fifteen minutes later, he had a piece of paper full full of arguments defending the thesis that egoism somehow is a bad thing for a businessperson. She gave the paper a last glance and announced: "That looks good. It will certainly work."   
He grinned at her and thanked for the help. Freya couldn't help but think of what Anne had said before she had left-something along the lines of 'you both know that you don't need each other's help with this'. She had been right. Freya certainly didn't need a lot of help with statistics and he obviously didn't need a lot of help with this stuff. Damn Anne and her psychology major. The girl was too good at understanding people. "I fear we seem to be more or less done with this absolutely fascinating topic.", he announced, voice full of irony.   
"We appear to be. I now deem it to be necessary to start with statistics, don't you agree with me on that?"   
If he wanted to start a 'who can sound more old-fashioned'-competition, he better be careful with whom.  
Appearing to be totally out of context, he asked: "That edge around your 'th'. I've been wondering about that 'th' of yours since we started this conversation. A girl with a first name rooted in Nordic mythology, a British last name and a definitely neither Scandinavian nor British edge around her "th", studying business in Oxford. There must be a story behind this, would you care to tell me?"   
He gave her one of these looks that she until now thought only tiny kittens could give-a look that immediately makes you want to fulfil their wishes. Damn him.   
She sighed and decided to answer. "I was born in Germany, under the name Freia Winter. 'Winter' also is a German last name, it means exactly the same as in English and is written the same, though the pronunciation of course is different. 'Freia' just is the German version of 'Freya'. I had it changed a year ago because I was tired of people messing up the spelling. My family and I had a complicated relationship, so when I was 17, I moved to my aunt in Birmingham, resulting in me seizing my chance to study here in Oxford two years ago, a good one and half hours of flight away from my parents, and living happily in England ever since, thanks to the EU that made it possible for me to live here without any visa hassle. I set foot in Germany only twice a year, for my grandmother's birthday and the birthday of my niece. Those family dinners are the most awkward occasions you can possibly imagine."   
He laughed. "Trust me, when it comes to family trouble, I know a lot from personal experience. This explains that wonderful way of saying the 'th', but doesn't explain the name. Why Freya, not anything else?" She shrugged. "I guess my parents just liked it. No special reasons. As far as I know, they didn't even have any interest in Scandinavian culture or anything. As complicated as our relationship is, I'm not angry about the name, I like it well enough. It's short, works in many languages and you British don't butcher the pronunciation." 

She later can't quite reconstruct how, but after this little conversation about her past, they never got back to anything remotely related to statistics or ethics.   
Instead, she somehow ended up not only knowing the story behind his first name-parents from Norway, but he grew up in England and the relationship between him and his family doesn't seem to be unlike the one between her an her own one- but also laughing her ass of at the-when regarded from a rational point of view utterly lame and offensive-joke "What's the difference between the U.S. and a Yoghurt? After 200 years of being left alone, the Yoghurt develops a culture."   
Brits. They have a weird humour.   
She took revenge at him by suddenly staring in his eyes-really good-looking eyes, by the way- and saying, in the most serious manner possible to her: "Donaudampfschifffahrtskapitänsmützenaufhängernormungsvereinjahresstammtischtreffen", which isn't even a joke, but they both burst out laughing anyways.   
After he calmed down a little, he asked: "What on earth was that, Freya?"   
"A German word. It means...gods, I think that's impossible to translate now. It's something about an annual meeting in a pub of a couple of guys who devote their lives to the norming of storing devices for those little caps captains of boats wear, more specifically captains of boats driving on a river called Donau."   
"You can express this in one single word in German? Gods, I thought we Englishmen are crazy."   
"You guys are tame in comparison to Germans, in some ways.", she replied with a raised eyebrow.   
Suddenly, the waitress was standing next to them again. "I'm sorry, but we are closing in a few minutes, I fear you need to leave."  
Freya's jaw dropped. "What time is it now, exactly?"   
"Close to midnight. We are closing earlier on weekdays."   
"Midnight? Oh my, I really need to leave!" They both payed, packed their stuff and walked out of the house a few seconds later.   
"Loki, what time exactly did we come here?"   
"Seven pm, why?", he answered with a smirk.   
"Gods, Anne is going to kill me." "Your roommate?"   
"Yup. She told me she'd stay up until I return in case you abduct me. I think she thought that was pretty likely, she sounded dead serious when telling me."   
He laughed. "Can I walk you home? I promise I won't kidnap you.", he offered to her, "it's pretty late and you don't seem to have come here by car."   
"Nope, I walked. Company on the perilous way back to my flat would be most welcome.", she accepted his offer.   
_At least you still have a little bit of irony in your sentences, girl. How are you explaining to Anne that you not-date lasted five hours?_  
She shut the voice in the back of her mind up, took the arm he offered to her and started walking. 

"Anne! I'm back!"   
A sudden burst of red ran into the living room Freya just entered. Anne grinned at her.   
"Soooo, Miss Winter, tutoring, right? Absolutely not a date? You were away five hours, and he absolutely walked you home, don't tell me otherwise, I saw the two of you walking down the street. You seemed to have a really good time!"   
Freya raised both of her hands. "Alright, alright, I admit defeat. Sort of. It wasn't tutoring, but it also wasn't quite a date." "Not quite a date, what on earth is 'not quite a date'?"   
"Listen, Anne, I had a really good evening, yes, I called him a thrice-damned asshole not six hours past, you don't need to tell me that. Yes, I probably lost all of my dignity by giving in to having fun, but..." "Shut up, girl. The only question of value is-", Anne placed both of her hands on Freya's shoulders and stared into her eyes,"As I said, the only question of value is whether or not there is a second meeting. I don't care how you call it, tutoring or date or whatever, but is there a second one?"   
Freya sighed. "You won. Yes, there is. On Saturday."


	3. Two people, one problem

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I thought for a while about whether or not I want to include that little bit about Freya's past relationships in here, but in the end decided to do it. She definitely is no angel and I wanted to bring that out.

_No_. He picked another shirt out of the wardrobe. _Hell, no._ Another one. Gods, no way he was wearing that to their...date, he supposed. Yet another one. _Yeah, that could work_ -he placed it besides him, were five other shirts already laid. Sighing, he put his face in his hands.

He was probably turning mad.

It was Saturday afternoon. In two hours, he needed to leave to be at the pub around seven, meaning in time.

He already was preparing since three o'clock. At least.

_I am turning mad_. _How full of irony that it wasn't some argument with my dear family that did it for me, but a girl I had a good evening with._

Since he asked her to 'tutor' him, a flimsy excuse if there ever was one, he had become obsessed with Freya Winter.

In fact, he had become so obsessed with her it scared himself at times, and he wasn't easily scared. Well, if truth be told, he already had thought about her more than he usually thought about the idiotic sheep that were his fellow students way before he ever spoke a word with her.

After he did however ask her for the tutoring, he had half-convinced himself that he did it to prove to himself that she was just as much an idiotic sheep as they all were, not because he genuinely wanted to see her-only to be met with a witty, sarcastic girl that made him laugh and seemed to actually enjoy her time with him.

It was crazy. He couldn't stop thinking about her, and the images came to him at me most unwanted of times: Her laugh, the way she'd raise one eyebrow when he said something she didn't like, how she sometimes twirled her hair around her fingers when she talked...

_Okay, boy, assemble whatever wits you have left and finally settle on a goddamn shirt. It's just a shirt. She certainly doesn't stand in front of her wardrobe since hours fussing over what to wear, so please don't completely loose your dignity._

_Red. Yeah, this red one will work._

 

_Nope, that one certainly won't do_. Freya stuffed the dress back in the wardrobe.

_Blue, perhaps?_ No, that looked absolutely weird with her eyes. Blue eyes plus blue dress just is a hit-or-miss, and that was certainly a miss.

She sighed and put her face in her hands. She was probably turning crazy.  

_Time to swallow your pride and seek help from someone better with fashion_ , she decided.

"Anne! Would you please come and help me?", she called.

Seconds later, Anne stands in her bedroom, grinning widely. "Oh, I see, you have finally accepted that you need help. I already wondered how long it would take."

"Shut up an help me choose an outfit that does neither make me look like a damsel in distress nor a slut. Please."  

Anne chuckled. "I'm going to remind you about this forever, I swear to god. Freya Winter, standing in front of her wardrobe two hours before she needs to leave, fussing over her outfit. I never thought I'd ever witness this. Which colour?"

"I don't know. Nothing green, though."

"Why? You look great in green, it goes with the reddish undertone in your hair."

"Yeah, but last time, we involuntarily showed up in matching outfits, and since I think green is his favourite colour, I want to minimise this risk."

Anne raised an eyebrow. "No green, then. What about red? It would bring out your eyes, and red is opposite to green, so..."

"Red is fine.", Freya sighed and fell back on the bed.

"I can't believe it,", she muttered, "I'm fussing about this since hours. I turned crazy, and it wasn't my dear family that did it for me, but a guy. A goddamn guy. Could you please search for my dignity in this wardrobe? I think I lost it."

"Sorry, that's above my competences. Here's a wonderful red silk blouse, though, and it's cut very crisp and clean, no ruffles or anything. That and some dark jeans plus heels, and you are good to go. He is tall enough for you wearing heels, isn't he? I mean, you are 5,7, but I remember him as being a good few inches taller than you." 

"It should work out, he's probably around 6,2 or something. They must feed them some weird growth enhancer back in Norway."

Anne chuckled. "Great, girl, here's your blouse, here's you jeans, and I'm still searching for your underwear.", she announced whilst throwing the items onto the bed were Freya laid.

The said shot up and asked, stunned: "My underwear? You can't be serious."

Anne smiled. "Exactly. Your underwear. I am serious. I know you, girl."

"I will definitely not sleep with him tonight!"

"Well, you said the same about having fun with him on Wednesday night, and here you are. You also definitely aren't the kind of girl that has a 'sex only after marriage' rule, you even have no problem with one-night-stands, to the point were we frequently have male visitors at breakfast that you quietly order out after eating. So, why not sleeping with him on date two?"

"I haven't even kissed him yet!"

"You have plenty of time to do that today.", Anne announced whilst throwing a pair of red lace panties and a red lace bra on the bed.

"You are impossible."

"Says the one who cheated on her boyfriend for three months without telling the guy she cheated on him with anything about the fact that she had a boyfriend, and then broke up with both because she decided they weren't smart enough because they didn't find out."

Freya cringed. "I still am ashamed for that. Not the breaking-up, though, that was the best solution for all of us, but the part before it really wasn't the greatest deed. I shouldn't have cheated on him, he was genuinely sweet and nice and in love. Just... Not right. Not smart enough, not sarcastic enough, to much a feeler, to little a thinker. That would never have worked. The other one wasn't better, just substantially better in bed and better looking. Ideal for any girl but me, probably." She laughed, a hard laugh. "That was years ago, though. We just moved together and you thought I was a crazy asshole. I probably was. Still am, most likely."

"Those were rough times for you, with that thing with your brother. Forbidding you to see your niece..." Anne shook her head. "He knew exactly that Lou is your only weak spot he had control over. You weren't yourself these days. What was his name again?", she asked. 

"Which one do you mean? My brother or one of the guys?", Freya laughed. 

"The second guy. I liked him better than the first."

Freya thought for a second.

"God, I'm not even sure I remember it correctly. I think it was Daniel, but it could have been David. I too did like him better than the first, but that probably was because he at least could talk to me for three minutes without me falling asleep. Number one only managed two."

Anne chuckled. "Other girls are categorising guys based on the number of minutes they last in bed, Freya Winter depending on the number of minutes they can hold a conversation with her without her dozing off. Did you notice any correlation between the two, though? I mean, Loki managed five hours of talking, perhaps we could calculate how long he..."

Freya threw a pillow at her, resulting in Anne giving a surprised shriek.

"Don't you dare, Anne! I may be an asshole, but even I always shunned of making charts or lists about the...lasting abilities of any guy I slept or talked with!"

Anne laughed. "I'm sure if I investigated that desk of yours, I may find a couple of interesting things, why not such a document?"

Freya glared at her. "Gods, you are impossible. You know my desk is sacred ground to me. And now leave, I need to get dressed."

"Sure." Just before she walked out, Anne turned her head and told Freya with a smirk: "And don't you dare forget the underwear!"

 

Shit.

It happened again.

Their goddamn outfits matched.

The universe was probably out to kill her.

Could also be a punishment for breaking Daniel's or David's or whatever his name was hearth.

After all, it was well known that karma is a bitch.

_Fuck you, universe._


	4. Walls and running shoes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another part of Freya's backstory! *Dramatic music*  
> And a little bit of smut! *Even more dramatic music*

"We seem to have enraged the universe, I can't explain how else we are always showing up in matching outfits.", he commented as a greeting.

She still wasn't quite sure whether she wanted to hit him to wipe this smirk from his face or not. In the end, she decided against it and replied: "We could now find out whom of us the universe hates so much, and send this person to a monastery to live as a monk or nun and make amends for his or her sins."

He sighed as he sat down on the chair opposite to her. "No monasteries, please. Celibacy would absolutely go against my plans for this evening."

Her jaw fell down for a second before she recovered from this announcement and managed to conduct a reply. After a short guffaw, she asked: "And what do you dream about at night?"

He smirked. "Why, you, of course. Though my dreams tend to get more...graphic when I'm not consciously restraining them as I do at daytime."

 

Three hours later, they were standing in some hidden corner of a rather obscure little alley, her back is against a wall and his mouth on hers. _Gods, he's good at kissing, but also quite different than expected._

She had expected a lot of teasing, that he would try to make her ask for it-not that it would have worked-, but not this raw, frantic need and desperation.

She had her hands in his hair, he his ones in hers- _where are my chopsticks, by the way?_ -, each one trying to get the other even closer, and it was all lips and tongues and teeth and need.

He moved down, lips brushing against her throat, and she couldn't help but let out a little moan, resulting in him smirking against her skin.

"I already thought I'd never get you to vocalise.", he murmured.

She gave a little chuckle before suddenly grabbing him and flipping them over so he was now standing back against the wall. "Better don't get too full of yourself, though.", she breathed against his neck whilst her hands started unbuttoning the blouse.

"Well, let's see how this will be going, perhaps I'll be allowed to be full of myself at the end.", he gave back whilst unbuckling her trousers. She couldn't see his face, but she could practically hear the smirk.

She let the blouse fall to the floor-she couldn't bring herself to care about dirt on it at the moment-and started working on getting rid of his jeans whilst their lips found their way to each other again, only that this time, one of his hands was between her legs and _oh_ -another sound, this time a little sigh. He smiled against her mouth before resuming his rhythm, and gods be damned, he was way better at this as anyone had any right to be.

A messy tangle of arms and legs and a condom followed, and suddenly, he was inside of her and they mindlessly fucked each other.

Freya usually wasn't the person to forego technique and have raw, desperate sex in a goddamn alley against a goddamned wall, but as she came with the third little sound-a gasp, this time-she decided it was awesome.

 

Later, as they both leaned against the wall and put on their clothing again in the dark-there were no working street lights in this really shady street, and she was probably putting in her blouse with the wrong side out-she couldn't help but laugh.

Not chuckle, not smile, but laugh, laugh loud and full.

Man, it was good to laugh like that again, the last time she did it was a long time ago.

He stopped moving, and then asked with an almost worried voice, as if he thought she had gone crazy: "Freya? You're fine?"

"I am,", she laughed, "more fine than I was in quite some time. Probably since I was seventeen, and that's five years ago. I just had the weirdest realisation, and it's so absolutely crazy, I had to laugh."

"And what exactly did you realise?" Still that concerned tone.

She gave out a last little chuckle. "I realised that at this moment, I absolutely act like the stereotypical girl."

"Why?"

"Well, because I managed to fall in love with you, and it's the stereotype that girls always fall in love with the assho-"

She didn't manage to end the sentence, though, because he kisses her then, hard at first, but very carefully, as if she was something that could easily be broken, at the end.

"I really don't mind that you are stereotypical in this one aspect.", he whispered in her ear as the kiss ended.

They stood there for quite a while afterwards, hands entwined together, her head leaning against his shoulder, backs leaning against the wall, just quietly listening to the sound of their breathing.

After some minutes, she sighed and remarked: "It's late. We ought to go before some gangster finds us and we get shot before we even managed to have sex in an actual bed, because that's a prospect I'm very much looking forward to. My back is probably going to kill me because of our thing here."

He chuckled. "For me, it's going to be the knees. They'll scream bloody murder. But I can't quite bring myself to regret anything."

"Same here, I have no regrets. Let's go, though."

"Yeah. I'll walk you home."

"Great."

 

She saw him off at the front door with a kiss, a kiss that nearly resulted in another back-and-knees-killing happening against a wall, but she managed to prevent this outcome and actually say goodbye, or rather, "see you Thursday". Her dignity thanked her for it.

_Girl, you rally have a hand for getting yourself into trouble_ , she couldn't help but think as she silently walked into the living room. _Having sex in an alley is one thing, but falling_ _in love with him, and, even worse, telling him you did..._

Freya sighed and put her face in her hands. Some part of her, the trusting, emotional part that was influenced by hormones and amazing sex just always seemed to take the reigns away from the rational, cautious parts of her when she was seeing Loki. She didn't quite know how that made her feel.

_It makes me vulnerable. It's dangerous. I grow emotionally attached to him, and that's not only unusual for me, but also so very risky!  
_

She didn't want to give it up, though. It was scary, how many walls she could and in fact did put down around him, but she didn't want to stop it. That almost scared her more than the fact that she let her walls down in the first place.

_I need to go running._

Going running was Freya's recipe for emotional trouble. Since she usually had a lot of emotional trouble, she was very good at running.

_What's the time right now?_

She checked the kitchen clock, whose digital display informed her that it was close to one in the morning.

_As good a time as any,_ she decided, _I'll just take pepper spray with me._

A few minutes later, she had put in running clothes and shoes as well as performed a few stretches, all in silence, as not to wake Anne. She grabbed the little bag that she could tie around her waist as she always did when running and stuffed pepper spray, her mobile and the keys in it. Then, she finally headed out the door.

It was cold outside, and the air tasted of snow. She took a few heavy breaths and her feet automatically found the rhythm they needed to: Fast, yet steady. The sound of her steps against the ground never failed to comfort her. She let her body take over, it knew the route.

_Maybe I just need to let it happen. Maybe this weird relationship works exactly the same way running does: Just let it happen._

However, some other part of her knew this wasn't right. Relationships meant emotional attachment, and that was dangerous.

_I can't run away from forming bonds with people forever. I managed to do it with Anne and aunt Caroline and Nick, why not Loki?_

She knew the answer to that too: Because love was even more dangerous than friendship. Love was bound to become an ugly affair in the end.

_It became an ugly affair once, that's true. But I can't let my childhood haunt me forever, can't I?_

She still remembered it all so very clearly.

Her family had always been conservative to the bone, and this always had been a problem. Freya believed in gay marriage, they believed that you aren't allowed to do what is forbidden in the bible. Freya believed in equality, they thought that 'women are just better suited for children than a career'. It always had been a problem, but she always thought they'd be able to coexist until she finished school and went to study abroad. Deep down, she loved them, after all, even though it was complicated. She thought it would somehow work out with them.

It didn't. 

Whe she was around fourteen, fifteen, they somehow got truly radical. Her parents, formerly just very conservative, now couldn't pass a day without remarking that Freya should 'stop focusing on school so much and rather learn something useful for women, like cooking'. Her brother, who had been twenty-five at the time, but was still living at home, got pulled in and became the worst of them all. 

Before long, she needed to deal with constant verbal attacks, controlling behaviour, and accusations. It freaked her out.

Until one day, she couldn't take it anymore. 

She had just turned seventeen a few weeks ago and they were sitting together, eating dinner at the kitchen table. Suddenly, her mother had switched the topic to birth control and how disgusting it was to take it. Freya had argued against her mother, and somehow, they both got pretty wrapped up in the argument, and before long, they were both standing and screaming at each other about something completely unrelated to birth control.

The next she remembered was a blazing pain she felt in one side of her face. Her brother had hit her.

What followed could best be described as a storm of anger raging through her, resulting in her flinging herself against her brother and engaging a full-blown fist fight with him.

Her brother was older and heavier, but he had always been a couch potato and Freya was tall and atlethic, so the fight even was halfway fair, but before long, ther parents had pulled them apart and were screaming something in the background whilst her brother was insulting Freya.

She didn't quite know what, but something snapped inside of her at this moment. She realised that it was enough.

So she wrestled herself out of her mother's grip, ran up the stairs to her room, grabbed a bag, her passport and her purse, ran downstairs again and left through the front door, slamming it behind her.

She had stayed at a friend's place that night who thankfully didn't ask any questions about why she was standing at her front door at ten in the evening with a giant bruise covering half of her face. Instead, Charlotte had simply given her some ice to cool it and sat silently beside her as Freya bought a one-way ticket to Birmingham online at Charlotte's computer, and the next morning, Charlotte had driven her to the airport.

Freya hadn't informed aunt Caroline. She was too afraid of getting told that she couldn't come.

As she rang at her door, aunt Caroline was understandably surprised, but didn't ask any question, neither about her face nor how long she intended to stay. She simply gave her the bed in the guest's room and understood that Freya didn't want her parents to be informed about where she was.

Only two weeks later, as it became clear that Freya wouldn't simply disappear as she showed up, Carloline demanded the story, and Freya told it. The next day, her aunt helped her to move her registration to her house and signed her up at the local school.

She stayed with her for almost two years, and her aunt was more like a mother for her than her own mother had ever been. Caroline and Freya were similar in many ways, and when Freya was accepted into an university in Oxford and moved out, they never stopped staying in touch. Still, though Caroline had helped her to fix some of the broken pieces inside of her, and Anne and Nick had managed to glue some more of them together, Freya still was, well, 'emotionally handicapped'. This whole scene was proof to it.

_I'm crying. Shit_., she suddenly realised. _Gods, it has been five years. Five years. That's long enough to stop thinking about people you never liked much, shouldn't it be?_

She sighed and just sat down at the side of the pavement. How long had she even been running? She was out of breath, so it must have been quite some time. She checked her phone. Two thirty. _Shit_. That meant she could have runned well over ten miles, and she had no idea where she was.

_Time to call someone to pick me up_ , she decided. The fact that aunt Caroline was in Birmigham narrowed the choices down to two people: Anne and Nick. Nick was her best friend, he was probably even closer to her than Anne, but the deciding factor for calling him was that he was a night owl and probably wasn't asleep right now.

So she dialed the number, and after a few seconds, a very concerned Nick answered the phone.

"Frey? Are you okay?"

"Yeah, sort of, I just...got lost."

"Lost? God, have you been crying? You had your date tonight didn't you? If that guy did anything to you, I swear..."

"Nick, it's not because of Loki. Not exactly. I just... I needed to run, and the next thing I knew, more than an hour had passed and I was thinking about my family."

"So, just your typical reaction to strong emotions, or, in this case, falling in love, huh?", he asked softly.

"Yeah, I guess.", Freya replied with a thick voice.

"I'm coming. Give me the street name."

"Albert's street, according to the signs."

"Great. Give me a few minutes, I'm going to stay on the phone with you. Thank god my car has those speakers."

"Nick, what should I do? I seem to be an emotional cripple who can't deal with her feelings.", Freya asked in a soft voice.

Nick sighed. "Don't think about it this way. You are no emotional cripple, you just have an hard time trusting others, even just a little bit. You always assume it will end like your relationship with your family. Behind this shell of sarcasm, you just have a soft core, that's it. Nothing wrong with that. How did your date even go?"

"Good, I guess."

"Hm, is someone leaving out important information here?"

Freya chuckled a little. "He's smart, has a good, black humour, manages to make me develop feelings for him and give up my dignity enough to have sex with him in an ally. So, I guess you could say he's miracle."

"You had sex with him in an alley? Holy shit!"

"I don't quite know what I thought at that point, but I acknowledge that I have no regrets."  

"Frey, please tell me you're not going to freak out because of your fear of emotional attachment and stop seeing him. As much as I think it's weird, I think he's good for you. Falling in love probably is good for you."

"Says the guy who got his first girlfriend in high school and plans to propose to her this month. You never experienced how much pain falling in love can cause."

"Frey, I'm sorry to break the news on you, but neither did you. You never fell in love."

"That's not-"

She suddenly broke off.

"Shit, Nick, that's true.", she then said, in a very serious manner.

"I told you so. You may have loved your family, even if you didn't like them, but you never fell in love in the romantic sense. Not until now. Proves that this guy really is extraordinary."

Freya sighed. "He probably is."

"O'course he is. His name is Loki, right?"

"Yeah. You might have seen him once, at that cafe we were at, the tall one with the longish dark hair."

"The one that caused you to tell me that we immediately need to leave because he saw you and you definitely didn't want to talk to him?", Nick laughed.

"Yeah, exactly.", Freya gave back with a chuckle, "Guess my opinion changed a little. I still think he's sort of an asshole, but not worse than I am. So if I can handle my own asshole-part, I can definitely handle his."

"Oh, so he is type two?"

"Type two? What are you talking about, Nick?"

Nick chuckled. "Nothing, really. Anne and I just once talked about with what kind of guy you'd end up with, and came to the conclusion that he would either be the absolutely nice, socially awkward and sweet sort of person or..."

"Someone like me.", Freya finished the sentence.

"Exactly. Listen, I'm around the corner, wave so I see you."

"Great. Thanks for doing this, Nick."

"No problem."

Freya could hear his smile through the phone, and as his headlights appeared in the darkness, she knew that this whole mess would be alright in the end.

She fell in love, so what? Loads of people did and do so, and for many, it did result and still results in a great deal of happiness. She'd just give it a try. If it didn't work, she should still hit him and wipe that dammed grin off his face. Freya couldn't help but grin a little at this thought.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own anything.


End file.
